Crazy Girl(56)
I grimaced. That was basically what I was writing about, damn it. Alex was just as Brigham had described, but even as cynical as I was about men, I hated how ridiculous he made it sound—as if a man like Alex, couldn’t exist. “What’s your point?”
He didn’t answer my question. He simply moved on to asking another. “Orgasm in a Beamer, eh?” he finally said. “Sounds like a gangsta-player move. I’ve tickled the shotgun on a few ladies myself.” Glancing up, I met his stare. Why did what he had just said bother me so much?
His brows lifted as soon as his gaze met mine. “Holy shit, Hannah,” he gasped. “This was you.” He pointed at my computer. “Your face expresses all sorts of being offended.”
My face flamed. Brigham may have been open about his own sexual wants and experiences, but I wasn’t willing to go there with him. The characters were Alex and Katrina. There was no reason for him to think otherwise. “It’s fiction,” I replied.
His mouth curved up. “Based on actual events.”
How did he know this? Was I that terrible at hiding my thoughts? Rolling my eyes, I closed my laptop and began busying myself with packing it up. We needed to be at the gym in twenty minutes. It would only take five to walk across the street, but I was desperate to get out of this topic of discussion. “No, Brigham,” I groaned.
“Who is he?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I informed him.
“Hannah,” he said my name sternly, causing me to glance at him. “It was good. I can tell it meant something to you.”
My mouth suddenly felt dry. It had been good. More than good. It had been amazing. And I’d held on to it, knowing I would write it so well, knowing it would make an amazing scene in my novel. But it had been more than that. It had meant something to me beyond its potential for a place in my book. Wren took me somewhere that night, and I didn’t mean literally. He gave me something I didn’t know I had been dying for—my own passion. He took me beyond my worries, beyond the voices of characters in my head, away from reason and overthinking. He took me outside of myself to my own spontaneous, reckless, and erotic scene. My stomach knotted with that thought.
“Boyfriend?”
Clearing my throat, I managed to chuckle, pretending his question was ridiculous. “No. I just made this up. It didn’t have anything to do with me. I’m just a good writer.”
Brigham eyed me suspiciously as if he didn’t believe me, but he didn’t push. “That’s good then.”
I frowned. “What does that mean?”
“Just means if you were dating the kind of guy we just talked about, a guy like me,” he pointed to himself, “I wouldn’t want you getting your hopes up.”
His words slammed into me, knocking the wind right out of me. Moving numbly, I followed behind him to the parking lot, wondering if I’d even be able to make it through the game tonight. He didn’t tell me anything I hadn’t already told myself. So then why did I feel so…hurt? Why did hearing him say what I’d already told myself a million times affect me this way? Because I had started to let my guard down. I’d started to believe again.
“What makes you think I would date this type of man?” I queried, my voice weak.
He smirked. “Because women are always trying to make a man into what they want. Rarely do they want him for what he really is. Add that to the fact no matter how pretty you are, how funny or smart or any other amazing quality you may have, you can’t keep a man that doesn’t want to be kept and… Well… It’s as simple as that.”
I kept walking, my heart breaking as I moved. I hadn’t liked hearing that either.
Somehow, I pushed it all down and made it through the game, though I wasn’t fully engaged. Afterward, while Brigham was occupied with our coach, whose name I now knew was Womboye, I almost managed to sneak out of the gym without having to have a goodbye chat with him, but I wasn’t quite so lucky.
“Hannah, wait up!” he shouted to me just as I reached the double doors that led outside.
“Shit,” I whispered to myself before plastering on a smile and spinning around to wait for him.
He jogged to me with that knee-weakening grin on his face, his gym bag hung on one shoulder, his forehead still glistening with the slightest sheen of sweat. He was wearing a t-shirt with the sleeves cut off, which showcased his defined, muscular arms and upper body. Yes, Brigham was a looker. But even as I admired him, I couldn’t help thinking he’s no Wren. “You trying to sneak out without saying goodbye?”
“No,” I lied, shaking my head. “I just didn’t want to interrupt you and Womboye.”
“Come on, I’ll walk you out to your car.”
I followed him out, wondering if the way he seemed to move past certain things was intentional, or if maybe he had ADD. There had been several times I’d say something and he’d just skate right by it, as if he’d never even heard me.
When we got to my car, the passenger side door creaked loudly as I opened it to toss in my bag.
“This is what you drive?” It was dark out, and I couldn’t make out his expression well in the limited lighting, but by the tone of his voice I could tell he was judging me. “Writing must not be paying well, I see.”